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Papua New Guinea

With some 836 dialects spoken, around 12 percent of all the world’s languages can be found in Papua New Guinea.

Tuberculosis

Tuberculosis (TB) is a major public health emergency, with thousands of new cases emerging every year. It is the fourth biggest cause of death in hospital admissions, and the principal cause of mortality among HIV/AIDS patients.

In collaboration with the national TB programme, our team has been scaling up the capacities for screening, diagnosis, treatment initiation and follow-up in Port Moresby’s Gerehu hospital. Mobile teams work in the community to improve patient adherence to treatment.

The adherence to treatment among patients in PNG is low. This is due to difficulty in accessing remote areas and a lack of an effective follow-up system. In collaboration with the provincial authorities, we are continuing to develop a decentralised model of care so that people do not need to travel to a medical facility as frequently.

Sexual and Gender-based Violence

Family and sexual violence are clearly widespread and destructive in Papua New Guinea. Patients face multiple obstacles for obtaining essential medical and psychological care, and they face severely limited options for accessing the legal, social and protection assistance they require.

A culture of impunity, and a continuing reliance on traditional forms of justice to solve serious family and sexual violence cases. Survivors become ‘double victims’ – suffering first from brutal attacks, and then from failures in service provision and in the protection system.

In Papua New Guinea, women and children endure shockingly high levels of family and sexual violence, with rates of abuse estimated to be some of the highest in the world outside a conflict zone.

There is simply not enough comprehensive medical andpsychosocial care for survivors of family and sexual violence. There is also no effective referral pathway toconnect them to assistance beyond immediate medical care,particularly in rural areas without hospitals, safe houses or aneffective police presence.